Hurry Back
by AngelaRB
Summary: I was watching my favorite show with a lot of my friends who are writers, and I said I wished I could write the script where the whole Caryl thing finally happened. This is my pitiful attempt of a one shot that I JUST wrote that is a short and sweet version of it.


She couldn't stand to watch them get their things ready to go to the town. It was like watching her friends get ready to go to their own funerals.

Carol was sitting at one of the cafeteria tables watching Rick, Daryl, Michonne, Maggie, Merle and Glenn pack up their guns and ammo, and the only way she would have felt more helpless would have been if she was being taken with them as walker bait. She so wanted to go with them and help them end this ridiculous conflict, but she'd only get in the way. Carol knew she did perfectly well when faced with the walkers, but when her target started to shoot back she was as useless as a bullet made of air.

They planned to leave soon. She had a bad feeling. One or more of them wouldn't come back.

Carol also felt like an ass of massive proportions because that certainty made her want to walk over there and tackle Daryl hard enough to break a bone so he couldn't go with them. _Dummy. A broken bone wouldn't stop him._

She couldn't take just watching them anymore. Carol got up and walked toward one of the cells so she could fret in peace. Before she did so, she walked past Daryl and squeezed his arm as a sign of "Come back to me." In the brief moments she stood next to him he looked down at her and gave her a "I'll do my best" look. She loved having him around because they could talk to each other without speaking a word.. The other reasons why she loved… no… needed him around couldn't come to mind right now because she'd start sobbing if she allowed herself to think about it.

The uncomfortable mattress in the cell was all the comfort she'd get right now. She was alone.

"Hey…" Daryl peeked his head around the corner.

_Don't cry yet, you wimp._ "Hey. Are you all about to go?"

"Yeah, soon."

"Well… be safe." She couldn't help but smile a little after hearing herself say the same words he'd said to her just a couple of days ago.

That maddening grin he only seemed to flash at her from time to time briefly made his face light up, so he must have gotten the half joke too. "I was just… you look like you're gonna puke."

"I look that good, huh?"

"No… I didn't mean." He immediately looked completely disgusted with himself and started to walk away. Carol couldn't let him leave thinking she was mad at him…

"Daryl, wait." She sprung to her feet and wrapped her fingers around his wrist. He flinched a little, and Carol couldn't help but note, again, how he reacted to gentle touches like that as if someone had taken a lighter to his skin. "Come back. I was kidding."

"I just don't want you to feel bad. We're going to be okay."

Carol sat back down on the mattress and crossed her legs under the same way Sophia always did when she was sitting around playing with her little doll that she managed to get out of the house when they were having to leave so suddenly. It seemed so long ago… "I have a bad feeling about this one. We've both just about used all of our nine lives."

Daryl sat down on the floor and rested his back against the bars. "Yeah… But at least you'll be safe. If I gotta go, I gotta go. No big loss there."

"Really? Listen, you can't say things like that to me. Any of us could die at any moment in this world, but you can't say that kind of thing to people who care about you. Jesus Christ…" Carol sprung to her feet again and got the urge to smack him on the leg with a crowbar to make him stay again. Her heart started to race so quickly that she feared it would burst out of her chest, and the dizziness must have been noticeable to Daryl.

He stood up and took a step toward her. "I'm sorry. I don't wanna die, I just… If someone had to I'd rather it be me."

She looked into his sad, tired, but oddly beautiful eyes and a type of bravery she'd never felt before came over her. "First of all, you just don't get it. Hell, you've been shit on just as much as I have in your life, and I'm just now starting to get it." She sat down and pulled him down to sit next to her on the bunk. He didn't protest at all. "When I was married to Ed he would beat me _really_ badly at times if I ever said what was on my mind. About anything. What to have for dinner, what color to paint the bathroom, whether or not I was allowed to go to my own mother's funeral…_anything._

"If I'd have known how bad it was I would have taken that axe to his head way before you did."

Their eyes locked for a moment or two, and then Carol had to continue. If she didn't say it now, she may never do it. "I know you would… But… In the last year I've been trying so hard to teach myself how to speak my mind. I think I'm doing well, but it's still really hard sometimes. I think part of me is scared he'll come through the walls or something and knock out a tooth if I speak."

His eyes were still locked on hers. "Nobody's gonna hurt you."

"That's part of the point. I feel safe when you're here. Just knowing you're in the same building as me makes me feel like nobody can touch me. I just…" _Just breathe. _"Nowadays life's too short to wait on things." She took a deep breath and looked into his eyes again. "What would you do if I kissed you right now?"

The intense gaze he was shooting her turned into the look of a man who was just hit by a stun gun. The only sound he could make was a quiet "Whaaahuuuh?" that was more of a whimper than a question. He didn't get up and leave the room, though.

_Okay then. _Carol quickly grabbed the back of his head and pressed her lips against his. A moment of fear came over her when his hand pressed against her arm. She wasn't sure she'd be able to take it if he pushed her away from him. Thankfully, the push she feared was a gentle _brush _of her skin that was better than anything Ed ever did to her in the entire twenty years that she knew him. Daryl obviously hadn't kissed much in his life, but it was just as soft and wet and warm as she always dreamed it would be.

When she finally pulled away from him, she feared Daryl would topple over in 1,000 pieces. He was swaying back and forth and looking down at his hands with his mouth slightly agape. "Listen, I don't want that to make you hate me or fear being around me. I'm the same Carol I've always been. I just couldn't let you leave without doing that. Okay?"

What happened next nearly made Carol topple in 1,000 pieces right along with him. He leaned forward and rested his forehead on her shoulder. He ever so slowly wrapped those big, warm arms around her and buried his face in her neck. "I… I'm not gonna die today."

Carol wasn't sure how much time passed with them that way, but it ended far too soon. "Daryl! Time to go!" Rick's voice bellowed from far outside the cell, and it quickly pulled them from their embrace. Daryl stood up and, much like a drunk person, stumbled toward the cell door. He was still stunned.

"I gotta… go. Yeah...uhm.."

"One more question." Daryl stopped and looked back at her. "Can I do that again when you get back?" _It's okay if you say no, but please don't say no._

Daryl gathered himself for a moment and flashed that quick, stunning, bashful grin again. He nodded his head to say yes, and left the cell.

Carol fell back on the bunk and wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. "Hurry back, then."


End file.
